November 23, 2013

“Varna” (Telugu) Dubbed from “Irandam Ulagam” (Tamil)


“Varna” is one of the most hyped films with visual effects created by the same team that worked for “Avatar”. It had everything going for it – a producer with deep-pockets (PVP) who is on a cyclical high, a director Sri Raghava (Selvaraghavan in Tamil) who gave great family entertainers like “Aadavariki Maatalu Ardhaale Vere” and “7/G Brindavan Colony” and a great looking pair- the blue-eyed Arya and the sweet-and-sensuous Anushka Shetty. Harris Jayaraj scores music and the lad who created “Kolaveridi” composed the BGM score for the film. With that kind of a team, there were huge expectations and even the trailer kissed a surge of optimism. Is the film worth the hype? Alas, No. Then what went wrong? It’s the script and the characterization again, stupid. Basics of entertainment were missing – no comedy, no romance that sticks and no entertainment value despite an extra-ordinary theme of love and other human emotions having inter-galactic appeal. Director has combined atleast two fairy tales with one half-hearted romance in modern times and then connects the two stories towards the later half.  The duration – 160 minutes – made it hard to concentrate a story involving two planets and the same lead pair – Arya and Anushka.

The story is all a flashback narration by the earthly hero Arya who is sinking in an ocean. He is a good Samaritan who falls in love with Anushka, a doctor. On the other planet, many light years away, a Goddess of love rules and is worshipped by all but the planet is effectively resident evil – wrong doers seized control of the planet where love is absent, women are ill-treated and shephearded as slaves and none of the human emotions abound. The goddess there sows the seeds of embryonic love between another Anushka and another Arya who is the son of the king. A few twists later, the earthly Arya is transposed to the other world where he eventually plays cupid between the two, culminating the wish of the Goddess of love. The  narration moves in tandem, and toggles between earth and the other planet – which looks like a supernova in color scheming but exotic and splendid in landscape and sky. Visually, the director transports us into a surreal planet full of mythical birds and beasts and flora that captures all the colors your eyeballs can absorb. A few fights here and there but most of the film moves slower than Telangana bill, the first half takes you to wit’s end to elaborate the love track between the lead pair in both the planets and only the three songs by Harris Jayaraj spruce it up.

Post-interval, the movie picks up  tempo but fails to elevate the characters or add to the story that was revealed at the outset in the form of a short animation film about the fight between evil and good. However, there are some beautiful moments in the film which leave you dazed and tranced – the snowy surroundings on the other planet where love and sometimes hate envelops the three characters on a mission ( shot in Georgia), the serene characterization of the Goddess of love, and the transformative powers of human emotions on machine-like men. All the best scenes get amply highlighted by the mesmerizing background music of Aniruddh. He will be a sought-after BGM composer after this film.  There are  big takeaways – how love drives a man to superior machismo than even a thousand military training camps and the emotions of kindness and human affections  are what makes our planet so unique in the universe. I do not know whether the message in all its subtlety will reach a wider audience because the multiplex I went to on day one was half-empty so do not know whether there is that much of nerve and verve to attract bigger audiences. It is slow, smooth but lacking in intensity of emotions – the very emotions humans can teach other beings. For most part, Anushka is shown as the one who sulks but in varied costumes. She gets a meaty role in two characters but it could have been etched better to make her characters evocative. She still carries the film on her shoulder, her costumes, her Xena-like warrior movements and swordly fights and her feminine grace light the screen. Arya as the earthly lover did better justice than the other-worldly warrior. Technically, the film looks stylish and defining in VFX for Indian Cinema. It might have cost more dollars than the marketing budget of a Hollywood animation film but if only some entertainment, comedy and ripened romance be uploaded into  this mix, “Varna” would have been a different tale. Audiences will forget a movie’s furniture pieces fast- the VFX, et al but never forget the lines, the chemistry of the love pair and the entertainment quotient. For that let down alone, and not for anything else, the film’s rating deserves 2.5/5 but not more.


Post-script: The themes of inter-planetary movement of human beings is explored by Indians also as much as Hollywood directors. Imagination must run wild to explore a start-trek kind of experience because thought can travel faster than light. There is nothing wrong with that because Hindu Astronomy recognizes that there are 24 earths in the universe which are similar to our own. Recently, we read somewhere that Russians have researched a possibility of the netherworlds lying under the earth’s crust which leads  to the worlds like Naga loka etc. talked about by fiction writers like Amish Tripathi. There are also ways and means defined in our own ancient books about many worlds that can be experienced once human beings go outside their sensory range – like experiencing the body in several realms, travelling in astral light etc. Cinema lends itself perfectly to such possibilities being explored. But where movies like “Avatar” click and movies like “Baba” and “Varna” fail is in deliverance on emotions and mass value. Hopefully, these lessons will be learnt well before deep-pocketed producers look for the exit door of the film industry.

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